The “Hugo Boss Asia Art Award for Emerging Chinese Artists” is currently on show at Rockbund Art Museum in Shanghai.
Of the 7 finalists NONE were women, which started me off round the exhibition in a right grump. However, some of the work brought me round soon enough.
Li Liao specializes in performance. For “Spring Breeze”, he was attached to an office building via a bike lock around his neck for the day. He passed the time smoking, looking at his phone and generally looking bored/uncomfortable.
Veronica Lu’s reaction to this made me chuckle, “I don’t understand why he is wasting time” she said… was she right? I’m not sure. I don’t think he was wasting time. I think he was feeling time, which is not quite the same thing.
Hsu Chia Wei’s film “Marshal Tie Jia” and its accompanying installation pulled me in despite there being too much Chinese history and anthropology to fully comprehend what was going on. I tried to embrace the mystery, but why did that bloke turn into a frog? And in what way is a pond a myth and an island politics?
No such questions arose with Kwan Sheung Chi’s genuinely funny video “Doing It With Mrs. Kwan… Making Pepper Spray” in which “Mrs. Kwan” guides the viewer through the preparation in the calm, cheerful and slightly patronizing way that daytime TV cooks do the world over. Some languages are universal.
